Pages

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Confronting the cliché

Here is the Baños quilt finished. There are many things I like about it, some I don't. I took a lot of liberties with the original photograph, leaving out a lot of details that were distracting and moving things (like the gate) to improve the composition. I also added the figure of the man passing by. He was not in the original photo, but in another photo. I simplified the background considerably. All this was fine. When I am working from a photo I feel no obligation to copy it exactly. It is simply a starting point. What I am not entirely happy about is that I seem to have "prettified" the old house more than I intended. One thing I especially like is the quilting on the foreground pathway.

I have been thinking a lot about clichés, by which I mean subject matter that has been done so often it loses meaning and impact. There are a lot of them. I have joked with my friends that there should be a moritorium on heron quilts. (Do a google image search on "Heron quilt" and you will see what I mean) Vine covered cottages, as the Baños quilt certainly is—another cliché. Thomas Kinkade has made a fortune on them. So, probably, are depictions of indigenous people in foreign locations. The thing about a cliché is, that it gets to become so popular because it is an image with great appeal. Me, I'm tired of so many heron quilts, but I can't resist snapping a picture when I see one standing among the cattails at the edge of a pond! So, the challenge for an artist, in my opinion, is not necessarily to avoid those oh-so-popular subjects, but to make them your own and offer a different approach to an old familiar subject. I had a discussion about this recently with a friend. I told her I was thinking about making a piece using a subject she has used frequently and referred to it as a cliché subject. I think I offended her and she thought I was saying her work was banal. Actually, I think her take on the subject is pretty interesting and I am trying to come at it in a different way—hopefully equally interesting, but quite different.

So, back to the Baños quilt. As always, I have been looking at it too long and have lost perspective. I am tired of seeing it and I know it will look different to me when I come back to it in a couple of months. But right now it strikes me as a bit of a cliché.

This turned out beautifully. I'll bet it's especially wonderful in person, but the detail and stitching show up great in your photo. The quilting adds so much. I love how you've done the shading under the eaves and the worn edges of the stucco wall -- very effective.

I've come around to thinking that there is no cliche-ish subject matter -- it's the treatment of subjects that can be so mediocre and seemingly everywhere. But the same subject matter, executed well with original vision, will always stand out and be successful. That's my theory, anyway. You know? Sort of like there's art, and then there's a lot of work where someone was aiming for art. So the trick is to do YOUR own vision of the subject matter and do it as well as you can.

This is an amazing piece. Since I am always looking for the story in a piece of art (even abstracts) or music, I really love this. The viewer can imagine so many different scenarios here, and that makes me want to keep looking. Is the person arriving, leaving, passing through? Is there someone watching from the upstairs windows, and what are their intentions? Is something going to come at us from behind the wall? I don't think the cliched cottages that you spoke of leave so much room for the viewer to step up.

Thanks for sharing both the work, and your thoughts about it. You are always interesting to read.

I am no art expert, but I would never characterise your work as 'cliche'. In fact, I love everything you make. I would say that you definitely bring your own artistic flair to each piece you create. I think your attention to detail is one of the things that helps make your work unique (e.g. love the seafoam and how you made it in the quilt of the glass ball on the beach). The tile work on these houses is wonderful.

Barbara, Banos is the town in Ecuador where I took the picture. The original picture and others of the area are here: http://andsewitgoes.blogspot.com/2010/06/thinking-about-banos.html

Tragically, two young people were recently killed in a fall in the canyon near Banos where I took some of the photos. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1287969/Quad-bike-Briton-killed-ravine-fall-Ecuador.html?ITO=1490

Very nicely done. And yes it is hard to "see" new work. At least it is for me, just too close to the subject and the execution. It can be so bad that at times I am thoroughly amused when people respond positively to my work.

I think your addition of your gentleman friend, adds a definite feeling of place, that those of us not knowing where your inspiration was located, can more easily place the house in a context that you intended.

I know what you mean by looking at a project too long. Usually by the time I'm done with anything, I need to put it in the bottom of a drawer for a month. When it goes in, it's awful. When it comes back out, I'm amazed at the transformation. Quite often I can't find what it was that made me put it in the drawer in the first place. A bit of distance does wonders.

I really like the addition of the figure. He brings a lot to the 'story'. You've also struck a nice balance between the detail of the roof and vine and the expanse of whitewashed walls. It definitely has a strong sense of place as opposed to the cliche' of "cute house with vine."

Terry you seem to be very direct and honest with yourself, and I think it is what keeps your work evolving, improving and interesting. I think to a point it's a good thing to be one's worst critic, otherwise one would fall into dull complacency. I see our mutual friend Deborah struggling with the same inner critic and though we all love both of your work, it's that inner critic that keeps you both growing as artists. Undoubtedly we'll continue to love your work because you won't settle for less than wonderful.